4 Ways to Maximize Old Heavy Duty Truck’s Economy

Maintenance certainly remains a big factor in increasing fuel efficiency. And certain training and instructive sessions can help drivers achieve more efficiency from their heavy duty trucks. Most of the times drivers are offered no instruction or orientation on their new advanced heavy duty trucks. When they don’t have enough understanding of their vehicles, how can they possibly achieve optimum performance?

Drivers habits, behaviour, skills and attitude can have a huge impact on fuel efficiency. A driver who merely knows how to drive properly is not classified as a good driver. Knowing essential things about your heavy duty truck such as its engine capacity, oil intake, fuel consumption, etc. is crucial, in order to keep the vehicle well-maintained. A good driver is someone who knows how to efficiently drive on uphills, how much to brake and accelerate, and making appropriate use of clutch mostly while shifting gears.
Given below are a few ways drivers can instantly maximize fuel economy:

Accelerate Gently:

Even though AMTs (automatic) will shift according to their programming, most take cues from how aggressively the engine growls. Perhaps this tip will help you remember to accelerate gently; ‘drive the truck like you have an egg between your foot and the throttle pedal. Don’t be so gentle that the truck simply halts. High throttle demand usually produces higher revs between gears and more aggressive shifts.

Avoid Unnecessary Braking:

Maintaining a certain gap between your truck and the vehicle ahead of you will reduce the need to decelerate for slower traffic and then speed up again. Braking a lot does not do any good to the brake pads, instead it enforces you to accelerate more and more. Getting off the throttle pedal sooner and coasting to a stop is better rather than braking, means less fuel burned. Use gravity generated momentum when safe to do so by rolling down a hill and part way up the other side, rather than braking on the hill to maintain a prescribed speed.

Don’t Idle:

Vehicles equipped with auxiliary climate control systems do not ever need to idle except a moments before shutdown after a hard pull. Remind drivers that all the myths they have heard that idling is necessary to warm up the engine, or that less fuel is burned during five minutes of idling when starting an engine are just that, myths! Shut off the engine whenever possible. Obviously, you shouldn’t shut the engine off if you’re stuck in a traffic jam, as igniting the engine again and again may consume more fuel.

Reduce the Gap Between Trailer:

Keep the trailer clinched up as close to the tractor as possible, when proper axle loading permits. Always remember, the tractor-trailer gap is a big fuel waster, and it should be minimized whenever the opportunity arises.

Instead of leaving the cruise control on all the time, manage speed and momentum in hills by backing off the throttle when nearing the crest of a hill, for instance. There’s actually no need to over the top at full throttle. For automatic heavy duty trucks, back off the throttle sooner when coming to a stop, and manage road speed according to traffic conditions rather than letting the cruise bring you in so close to another car that you have to brake. If you’re planning to buy or know more about old heavy duty truck’s, or if you want to know how to efficiently maintain your old heavy duty truck, get in touch with our heavy duty professionals.

Located in Edmonton, Alberta since 2004, Heavy Duty Direct (HDD) offers a high end heavy equipment and truck magazine to various businesses in the Industrial, Mining, Heavy Construction, Trucking, Oilfield, Forestry and Agriculture sectors. HDD is direct mailed to thousands of potential buyers in print and is inclusive of cutting-edge internet marketing as well as website design and search engine placement. The Heavy Duty Direct team is detail oriented and prides itself on exemplary customer service.
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